POSTED // Feb 4,2009 - nARIES (March 21-April 19)nI was watching a martial arts competition on ESPN TV. It featured a fierce macho dance-off, in which rivals took turns brandishing their high-octane warrior choreography. At one point the announcer waxed poetic as the eventual winner pulled off a seemingly impossible move: “And that was a corkscrew illusion twist rodeo spin!” In the coming week, Aries, I urge...

POSTED // Feb 4,2009 - Curses, Foiled AgainnPolice in Council Bluffs, Iowa, reported that a man who threatened a store clerk with a gun took cash and then pulled out a can of pepper spray and tried to spray the clerk. Instead, he accidentally sprayed himself in the face and ran away. n• A shoplifter who made off with $1,200 worth of designer purses from a store in Cape Coral, Fla., was run over twice by her getaway...

POSTED // Feb 4,2009 - My friend says Christians weren’t actually thrown to the lions in ancient Rome, but when I was at the Colosseum, I saw a big cross there in honor of all the Christians martyred at that spot. He insists this was just made up by the church to perpetuate their religion. What gives? —vbunny nThe story has its suspicious aspects, I guess. According to the historian Tacitus, Christians durin...

POSTED // Feb 4,2009 - Dear Mexican: I can’t tell you how disappointed I’ve been these past few days, as a U.S. citizen and ciudadano Mexicano, how I’ve been seeing more and more stories about los narcos and how the Mexican government keeps getting screwed over in newspapers. I think that you should dedicate a whole article in your column telling your gringo readers what their pot and crack consuming h...

POSTED // Jan 28,2009 - nARIES (March 21-April 19)nDon’t tell me you have nothing to be thankful for, Aries. Your parents could have named you “Hooligan” or “Lightsaber” or “Flu,” and they didn’t. There are no photos floating around the Internet that show you riding a pig in the nude. No one has ever broken up with you via text message. Now please keep going in the directio...

POSTED // Jan 28,2009 - Curses, Foiled AgainnPolice responding to a break-in at a convenience store in Athens, Tenn., identified their suspect when he returned to the scene two hours later. Officer Chandler Rollo told the Daily Post-Athenian he was at the store waiting for a manager to arrive with the key after someone shattered a glass door and entered the store. A blood-covered Roger Scott Buckner Jr., 21, approached R...

POSTED // Jan 28,2009 - In The Bad Girl’s Guide to the Open Road, Cameron Tuttle suggests the following technique for getting out of a DUI: If you get pulled over, immediately step out of the car with a bottle of your favorite liquor and chug a couple shots’ worth. The officer now has no way of proving you were drinking before you got out of the car. Interesting thought, but is this actually true? Perhaps the...

POSTED // Jan 28,2009 - Dear Mexican: I am a naturalized (legal) hispano in the United States, and I just realized what the “illegal” craze is about. What immigrant-bashing citizens are trying to protect here are people like … me. Consider what this concerned woman said to John McCain during a public meeting in New Hampshire last year. “I just think it’s not fair to all the people who came ...

POSTED // Jan 21,2009 - nARIES (March 21-April 19)nIn The Devil’s Dictionary, Ambrose Bierce defines history as follows: “an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.” Bear that in mind as you interpret what I mean by the following: You won’t make history in the coming weeks. Instead, you will help generate an ...

POSTED // Jan 21,2009 - Curses, Foiled AgainnWhen Jeffrey P. Cannon, 20, arrived at Washington’s Dulles International Airport from Ireland, customs officers detained him because a check of the passenger list turned up an outstanding DUI warrant. Officers searched his luggage and found “a large amount of tea bags,” Border Patrol official Steve Sapp told The Washington Post. The bags’ bulky shapes a...